When are you going back to work?

I figured I should get back around to answering the question I am asked all the time, "when are you going back to work?" 

It seems a little funny how much I am asked this, especially considering I wasn't really working before Risden arrived.  For about a year before I got pregnant I was working as a contractor at a great, small architecture firm in Boulder.  I love the people I was able to work with, and really enjoyed the work.  Plus the 5 minute bike commute wasn't bad either!  All in all, I loved using my Masters of Architecture degree and I loved the flexible environment.  This was the perfect job I thought that would allow me to work flexible, part-time hours once the baby arrived.  Unfortunately, the really bad architecture market caught up to our little firm shortly after I found out I was pregnant, and I found myself without work.  Roughly four months pregnant, Judd and I decided that me finding and starting a new job wasn't worth it.

The last few months before Risden was born were hard, but really good.  Having functioned most of my life striving to cram as much stuff and accomplishments into every day, I was due for a break, and a slower lifestyle.  I was forced to relax and not find my identity in the work I did, or the money I had to show for it.  Judd, being the most supportive and amazing husband imaginable, encouraged me every day to believe that I was simply enough.  Slowly I was able to relax, find peace in a quieter and slower day, and got a lot of great things done around the house in preparation for little man's arrival.  The whole time though, I kept telling myself that maybe, just maybe, things would pick back up at the firm and I'd be back in the work force just as soon as any other working mom out there would be.

Six weeks, eight weeks, three months and now four months post-baby have come and gone, and I am still not "back to work."  I have so many mixed emotions about this.  On one hand, I see the lull in my work before Risden's arrival as the perfect reason for me to take advantage of this time and continue to bond with him.  I mean really, I haven't even come close to getting tired of him.  I love everything about that little guy, especially most recently when he giggles and smiles all the time, and has started to try and imitate us in small ways.  By the time he goes to sleep I am so intensely exhausted because he is a lot of work and difficult at times, but mostly because I love playing with him most of the day.  I also have full support from Judd to stay home all day with Risden.  He has an awesome, solid job, and is more than happy to work every day so that I can be with the little guy. 

What's the problem then, right?  I just can't seem to shake this feeling that I should be doing more.  All around me are awesome mom's who not only seem to be raising their kids really well, but they also have great, flexible part-time jobs.  I am envious.  I wish I had something lined up, but I don't.  I wish I could practice architecture, but even in a good market this would be hard to practice part-time.

I have to ask myself where the root of this issue lies.  Do I want to be an awesome mom and have a sweet career so that I can show the world how good I am at doing everything simultaneously?  Yes, I am so incredibly insecure that I think the praise from others will solve all of my problems.  Am I scared to death that Risden (and any other additional kids we may have) will grow up and go on to college someday, leaving me home, with no career to keep me busy? Definitely.  Do I really want to practice architecture right now?  I'm not sure.  Is it more about keeping up an image?  Maybe.

Maybe I am sitting here, writing this, as a mom.  And a wife.  And my job is to be a house-maker.  For now, maybe not forever, but maybe for awhile.  I do wholeheartedly want to have a career again, someday, but maybe that day is not today and maybe it won't even be for a few years.  And maybe I need to break up with that pesky thing called "guilt" (and "fear", and "comparison", and "insecurity") that continues to show up at my door.

So to answer the question of when I plan to go back to work, to that I am not sure, but it might be awhile.